Another proud moment in Australian race relations- from perthnow.com.au:
Aboriginal MP Ken Wyatt gets racist hate mail
THE first Aborigine likely to be elected to the House of Representatives has received hate mail from people who said they would not have voted for him if they had known he was indigenous.
Mr Wyatt, 58, destined to be the first Aborigine to be elected to the House of Representatives, said his near-certain triumph in WA’s ultra-marginal seat of Hasluck had been tarnished by a racist backlash.
The upset Liberal candidate said his office had received at least 50 emails and telephone calls from angry voters who accused him of only being interested in indigenous issues.
He also endured racist abuse while walking through Guildford in his electorate, with one man calling him “Uncle Tom Wyatt” on Thursday. Mr Wyatt was with his 28-year-old son Aaron at the time.
“It’s a term used to describe a person who has sold out and denied their cultural heritage,” Mr Wyatt said. “My son asked me what it meant. I just said ‘Don’t worry about it, it’s a derogatory term’.
“It just surprised me that he used that term. I wouldn’t expect it in this day and age.”
But it’s the mail and phone calls that have surprised and hurt him most.
“I am surprised at some of the hate mail,” he said.
“Some said ‘Wouldn’t know you were indigenous - we wouldn’t have voted for you if we did’.
“And yet it was out there in the media all the time (that I was an Aborigine). It was on one of my flyers.
“After all the work that the Australian Government has done, I am surprised there are still individuals who hold these strong views and are prepared to commit (them) to writing.”
Ironically some of the criticism levelled at Mr Wyatt this week has come from Aborigines.
“Three Aboriginal people wanted to know why I had joined a racist party,” he said. “That’s not true at all.”
Mr Wyatt said he stood for more than Aboriginal issues.
“I stand for all political persuasions and all culturally and linguistically diverse groups in Hasluck,” Mr Wyatt said.
“I am proud of my heritage and absolutely exhilarated at being the first indigenous candidate in the House of Representatives, but for me it is about Hasluck and the people of Hasluck.
“I intend standing up for everyone in the party room and in the House, and I am going to stand up for WA.”
The Liberal candidate has not been officially declared the winner of last Saturday’s contest over Labor’s Sharryn Jackson. But with nearly 91 per cent of the votes counted, Mr Wyatt leads by 856 votes.Labor state secretary Simon Mead said that with nearly 3000 postal votes yet to be counted, Ms Jackson would not be conceding defeat.
Prior to contesting Hasluck, Mr Wyatt was the director of Aboriginal Health within the WA Department of Health. He received the Order of Australia in 1996 and the Order of Australia Centenary Medal in 2003.
Mr Wyatt plans to fly to Italy in December to marry long-time partner Anna-Marie Palermo.
Apologies, this took a little while to post. Thanks to the Perth Voice for permission to republish this article.
Far-right filtered by DAVID BELL The Perth Voice, March 13,2010
AN anti-censorship protest was hijacked last Saturday by members of the far-right Nationalist Alternative movement spreading an anti- immigration message.
The Stop the Filter protest was aimed at the Rudd government’s plan to block material refused classification in Australia.
While Greens senator Scott Ludlam was addressing the 300-strong crowd in Forrest Place a scuffle broke out on the balcony above, when half-a-dozen members of the NA unfurled a banner reading “save water, cut immigration”.
There was a short tussle with the NA, the banner was torn down and a “no room for racism!” chant took hold in the largely left-wing crowd.
Ironic
Jack from the NA wouldn’t give his last name, but said it was ironic his group was censored at an anti-censorship rally.
He said NA opposed Labor’s “nanny state” law and had just as much right to display its banner as the socialist Resistance group did. “They’re pro-censorship…that’s hypocrisy.”
Socialist Ben Peterson, who’d helped tear the banner down, denied his actions amounted to censorship.
“If someone was to spray paint something racist on the side of your house, then removing that isn’t censorship.
“We’d organised Stop the Filter through the council and with the police, and [the NA], in a very hostile manner, arrived and tried to get around that and then tried to claim that it was censorship. “We’re not a group to push racism and it’s not censorship to make sure that our event isn’t associated with that.”
Senator Ludlam agreed, saying there was a difference between free speech and hate speech.
“I certainly didn’t read that ascensorship,” he said. “I’m certainly against hate speech. If they’re running up anti- immigration banners at a rally for free speech, especially behind the speaker, it’s completely out of line. It was a grab for attention, in extremely bad taste.”
But NA says the Resistance banner had nothing to do with the rally theme either, focusing on “planet before profit”. On its website NA said both Resistance’s banner and its own carried environmental messages.
Senator Ludlam called for the campaign against internet censorship to continue, warning Labor was just weeks away from introducing the laws to the parliament. “This is not about whether we trust Kevin Rudd or [minister] Stephen Conroy…what about an Abbott government? Once it’s in this will be impossible to roll back.”
Figures indicate a police race bias in juvenile arrests
Stephen Lunn, Social affairs writer | September 28, 2009
POLICE across Australia are far more likely to arrest young Aborigines and see that they go to court than non-indigenous juveniles, who are considerably more likely to be let off with a warning or caution.
A groundbreaking study by the Australian Institute of Criminology to be published today paints a disturbing picture of young Aborigines’ contact with police. It may go some way to explaining why indigenous 10 to 17-year-olds are 28 times more likely to be in detention than non-indigenous youths.
Pulling together for the first time comparative national data on young people’s contact with police and the courts, the AIC report reveals the differential treatment of indigenous children doesn’t stop at the front gate of the juvenile justice system.
In at least two states, Western Australia and South Australia, young Aborigines are more likely to be convicted in children’s courts than non-indigenous juveniles for the same type of offences, the report shows. No other states provided data on conviction rates.
In Western Australia, the one state that issued statistics on sentencing, young Aborigines are more than twice as likely as non-indigenous juveniles to be given a jail term after being found guilty.
The AIC study, “Juveniles’ contact with the criminal justice system in Australia”, finds that in NSW, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia and the Northern Territory, police are more likely to arrest and refer to court young Aborigines, compared with non-indigenous youths. Information from Victoria and Tasmania was not available.
“(In NSW in 2007-08), 48 per cent of indigenous juveniles were transferred to court, compared to 21 per cent of non-indigenous juveniles,” the report says.
“And 32 per cent of non-indigenous juveniles receive warnings compared with 18 per cent of indigenous juveniles.
“(In Queensland in 2006-07), indigenous juveniles were more likely to be processed by way of arrest (39 per cent) than any other method, while non-indigenous juveniles were more likely to be dealt with via a caution (49 per cent) than any other method of processing.”
In Western Australia, where half of all juveniles arrested are Aboriginal, 71 per cent of the cautions issued in 2005 were to non-indigenous youths, 29 per cent to Aboriginal juveniles.
In South Australia in 2005 (the most recent data available), 55 per cent of juveniles of “Aboriginal appearance” were transferred to youth court compared with 41 per cent of those of “non-Aboriginal appearance”, while in the Northern Territory last year 23 per cent of non-indigenous youths received a caution compared with 16 per cent of Aborigines.
AIC director Adam Tomison said the fact that many young indigenous Australians lived in disadvantaged circumstances went a long way to explaining their increased contact with police.
“In terms of whether there is bias or racism in their treatment, I think you would need to do further studies looking at police contact in disadvantaged communities where there are kids of different backgrounds,” Dr Tomison told The Australian.
“Then we would start to tease out how much of this is an issue of Aboriginality and how much is poverty and disadvantage.
“Also geography comes into play. Authorities in states with more remote communities have fewer options to divert juveniles from detention. If there are two young offenders, and one is from a relatively good home in an urban environment with plenty of treatment options around him and the other is from a remote location where similar options are extremely limited, who is more likely to be put in detention?”
The report notes that once indigenous juveniles reach children’s courts, data is harder to come by, as indigenous status is not reported in most states. Only WA and South Australia provided figures on indigenous outcomes in court.
“(While they) cannot be considered representative of the other jurisdictions or of Australia’s children’s courts generally, they nonetheless provide an important, albeit partial, insight into the contact that indigenous juveniles have with the children’s courts,” the report says.
“(In South Australia), 29 per cent of juveniles of ‘Aboriginal appearance’ were found guilty of charges of larceny and receiving offences, 21 per cent of offences against good order and 20 per cent of criminal trespass. This compares with 18 per cent of juveniles of non-Aboriginal appearance found guilty of larceny and receiving, 17 per cent of offences against good order and 12per cent of criminal trespass.”
WA’s data from 2005 also shows discrepancies between the conviction rate for indigenous and non-indigenous youth.
“Eighty-two per cent of indigenous males were found guilty compared with 76 per cent of non-indigenous males before the children’s court,” the report says. “For female juveniles, this disparity was even more pronounced, with 79 per cent of indigenous females found guilty compared with 66 per cent of non-indigenous females.”
If convicted, jail was a more likely outcome for Aboriginal youths. “A considerably higher proportion of distinct indigenous juveniles (22 per cent) were sentenced to custodial penalties than non-indigenous juveniles (9 per cent) during 2005,” the AIC found. “Conversely, a considerably higher proportion of distinct non-indigenous juveniles (35 per cent) received a fine than distinct indigenous juveniles.”
A RACIST video posted on US-based internet site YouTube is yet to be removed, despite a Perth man being charged for allegedly uploading the anti-Semitic film.
Police Commissioner Karl O’Callaghan today said his officers had so far been unsuccessful in their negotiations with YouTube to have the controversial video pulled from the site, but inquiries were continuing.
Maylands man Brendon O’Connell, 38, was yesterday charged under racial vilification laws for allegedly posting anti-Semitic video on the internet site.
Mr O’Connell is seen on film in front of Perth’s Bell Tower and at a South Perth supermarket while allegedly making anti-Semitic comments.
He was yesterday charged by the police State Security Investigation Group with conduct with intent to incite racial animosity or racist harassment.
The maximum penalty for the offence is 14 years’ jail, or fines of up to $24,000.
“Our officers have been dealing with youtube,” Mr O’Callaghan told reporters this morning.
“They are a US based company. We don’t have any jurisdiction over them, but we have been working with them to pull the video down and they have been fairly co-operative in the past.
“Now I can’t forecast what the outcome will be here, but we are continuing to work with youtube on the issue.”
Opposition Multicultural Interests spokesman John Hyde - who alerted police, Jewish community leaders and the Ethnic Communities Council of WA about the videos - praised WA Police for using the anti-vilification laws to lay the charges.
“Members of the multicultural community can take comfort in the knowledge that this alleged race hate crime will now go before the courts,” Mr Hyde said.
It is believed to be the second time a person has been charged under the racial vilification laws, which were introduced by the previous Labor government and were designed to outlaw the publication, distribution or display in oral, written or pictorial form of material that was threatening or abusive and intended to cause hatred or contempt or ridicule.
Update
Friends of Palestine note in a press release that the individual in question was never a member of their organisation and had crashed their protest, presumably for his own ends. FightDemBack! would like to remind commentators that the Friends of Palestine are an innocent party to this incident and have publically condemned Anti-Semitism as unwelcome to their cause.
First, Nicole Hanley, an Australian employee of French corporation ‘The Thales Group’, has been suspended from her job following revelations that she is an active member of the international neo-Nazi skinhead organisation ‘Blood & Honour’:
One of Australia’s largest Defence Department-linked companies has suspended a contractor over her alleged links to an international neo-Nazi group.
Nicole Hanley, a bid support manager for Thales - which has hundreds of millions of dollars in Department of Defence contracts - is alleged to have been involved as an administrator of the neo-Nazi web forum Blood & Honour.
The claims have been made by whistleblower site Wikileaks, which has published a hacked database containing private messages between the group’s members.
According to the Wikileaks private message trail it is claimed that Hanley has published a detailed online diary of her travels to Europe last year, which included attending several neo-Nazi skinhead gatherings, visiting Adolf Hitler’s birthplace, placing flowers on his parents’ grave and collecting Nazi memorabilia…
Secondly, B&H Australia has encountered a spot of bother following reports that the group is organising a gig in Perth on ANZAC Day (April 25). In response to criticism emanating from the RSL and general public, B&H Perth representative Murray Holmes compared Adolf Hitler to John HoWARd!
Mr Holmes said fascism had come a long way since the days when Adolf Hitler was Fuhrer.
“We’re not disciples of Hitler,” he assured.
“Adolf did some good and he did some bad, like Johnny Howard did good and bad, probably more bad than good.”
Joining Murray on stage on April 25 will be Jesse, a bonehead (and member of another nutzi group the Southern Cross Hammerskins) who sings in Melbourne band Ravenous. Jesse is also involved in a new business venture called 9percentproductions.com. A perusal of their online catalogue suggests that, contra Holmes, little has changed for nutzis since Adolf Hitler blew his brains out while hiding in his bunker in 1945. Some of the many fabulous items on sale include:
‘Der ewige Jude’ (The Eternal Jew) by Volkszorn;
‘Fetch the Rope’ by The Klansmen;
‘Freezer Full of Nigger Heads’ by Grinded Nig and;
‘Alcoholocaust’ by Jew Slaughter.
An event widely recognised as being pivotal in shaping Anglo-Australian relations occurred in 1882, when an Australian cricket team beat England on an English ground for the first time. The following day, on August 30, 1882, the Sporting Times carried a mock obituary to English cricket which concluded that: “The body will be cremated and the ashes taken to Australia”.
Hence: The Ashes.
(The first team to tour England, in 1868, was composed of Australian Aborigines, and coached by Tom Wills, who was instrumental in developing the game of Australian Rules football. Wills is honoured with a sculpture at the MCG by Louis Laumen, erected in 2002. The sculpture reads that Wills: “Did more than any other person - as footballer and umpire, co-writer of the rules and promoter of the game - to develop Australian Football during its first decade”; a contribution based — arguably — on his knowledge of and familiarity with the game of marngrook.)
2) The Nutzi Version
As noted several weeks ago, Perth nutzis have some ashes of their own: dead nutzi David Lane’s ashes. Upon announcing that the handful of dust would be scattered in Perth, on Stormfront Down Under, a Victorian Creator asked (February 11): “Sounds good. Who is hosting the event?” To which the ever-helpful Stormfront Down Under moderator Paul Innes (’Steelcap Boot’) replied:
Mr David Lane.
I have just returned from witness to the package that contained the ashes.
All those White Nationalists who wish to attend and show their respects during this overdue service for David [L]ane here in Western Australia will need to contact W.O.T.A.N@hushmail.com
Combat 18 Accused Of Purloining David Lane’s Ashes
Larry Keller
March 11, 2009
He’s been dead nearly two years, but there’s a fight brewing in the white nationalist movement over one of its heroes, David Lane.
Actually, the brouhaha is over only a part of Lane. About one-fourteenth of him. That portion of his ashes is reportedly in Perth, Western Australia, more than 9,000 miles from where he died in Indiana. The last time a dead man’s ashes traveled this far may be when the cremains of LSD devotee Timothy Leary and Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry were blasted into orbit in 1997.
How Lane’s ashes got all the way to Perth is a matter of controversy. Women for Aryan Unity activist Victoria “Vickie” Cahill is accusing members of the Australian division of the violent neo-Nazi skinhead group Combat 18 of misappropriating the ashes “through lies” and then “sending rape threats, threats of beatings” to Cahill and other WAU members when they protested.
“We want those ashes back,” Cahill posted to Stormfront and her MySpace page March 9.
Some background:
Lane died in March 2007 in a federal prison in Terre Haute at the age of 68. He was serving a 190-year sentence for racketeering, conspiracy and violating the civil rights of Denver radio talk show host Alan Berg, who was murdered in his driveway in 1984 by Lane and other members of the Bruders Schweigen, or Silent Brotherhood. The terrorist group was also known as The Order. Lane, a onetime member of the John Birch Society and the Ku Klux Klan, was a founding member of the group and served as the getaway driver in the Berg murder.
While in prison, Lane wrote screeds about race and became revered among white nationalists. He is perhaps best known for coining the “14 Words,” “We must secure the existence of our people and a future for White Children.” He co-founded 14 Word Press in Idaho to publish his writings. After his death, neo-Nazi stage mom April Gaede announced that she “and the gals from WAU [Women for Aryan Unity]” had created a memorial fund to have Lane’s ashes stored in the capstone of a pyramid monument to be erected in a white homeland, per Lane’s wishes.
But the gals couldn’t raise enough money for a full-sized pyramid, Gaede later revealed, and so they decided to apportion Lane’s ashes among 14 miniature pyramids – one for each of the 14 Words. Each of the puny pyramids was to be enshrined in the homes of 14 white nationalist women, including Cahill.
It wasn’t long before Gaede and Cahill and other members of Women for Aryan Unity were feuding over Lane-related matters, with Gaede accusing the WAU coven of “showing off” Lane’s remains at white nationalist events.
Now Cahill is urging a boycott of a proposed “ash spreading memorial service” for Lane in Perth. An invitation to “pro-White concious [sic] people” to attend the big event was posted last month on Stormfront. “Date will be finalized when attending numbers have been estimated,” it read. “Civil and neat attire is expected for the proceedings.”
Cahill is vowing to reclaim the ashes before said proceedings can proceed. “If I have to make my way to Australia to get these ashes I will,” she wrote. Cahill then added, ominously, “I will be contacting the bruders about this.”
Hmmm. The bruders ~ versus ~ the Innes brothers. I’d pay to see that.
ACHTUNG!
Jake is the man with the plan. And access to David Lane’s ashes. He’s also desperate for a drummer. His band, Indigenous Hate, will be playing a gig in Perth to celebrate the deaths of Australian soldiers in WWII. Scheduled to take place on ANZAC Day (April 25), it is being organised by Blood & Honour Australia and the Southern Cross Hammerskins, with Murray Holme’s band The Quick & the Dead and Melbourne band Ravenous. Jake (February 11, 2009):
Perth band Indigenous Hate are in desperate need of a new drummer. With weeks to go until some gigs, and half way through recording our album, our drummer has done the dodgy on us and left us in the dark. I am willing to pay for someone, anyone, across Australia, to come over to Perth and live for a couple of months so we can play the gigs and record the rest of the album. I can email a couple of songs that we have done in the studio to see what we sound like, but if you like hard, skinhead music, you wont be disap[p]ointed. Please contact me, Jake, A.S.A.P [at] W.O.T.A.N@hushmail.com.
Woman charged over ‘brutal train assault’ in Perth
Nicole Cox, police reporter
November 18, 2008
RAIL police have charged a woman with brutally bashing a train passenger who had asked her to tone down her offensive language.
Detective Sergeant Brian Beck told Perthnow that police yesterday apprehended a woman wanted over the October attack in which the female victim was allegedly punched in the face and had her head repeatedly slammed into the floor of the train carriage.
Acting on intelligence, officers attended a house in Marangaroo on Monday and discovered a 22-year-old woman hiding under a pile of clothes in a cupboard.
Police arrested the woman and have charged her with one count of assault occasioning bodily harm. She will appear in Perth Magistrates Court on Thursday.
The charges relate to an attack alleged to have happened on the afternoon of Saturday October 11, when Tegan, a 23-year-old receptionist, was bashed on a Stirling-bound train.
Tegan suffered terrible facial injuries and was treated in hospital.
Last week, Tegan’s lawyer Karina Hafford said her client, who feared reprisals, believed the attack would not have happened if security guards were on the train.
Ms Hafford said the victim and other passengers, including children, had moved to another carriage to get away from the woman’s “obscene and racist comments”.
A male passenger alerted the driver about the woman and was told security officers would be notified.
“When they got to the next station they anticipated security would get on the train and take action but no one did,” Ms Hafford said.
“As they approached Stirling Station the alleged assailant walked down the aisle towards our client threatening to bash her. She then punched her in the face and repeatedly slammed her head onto the floor.”
Ms Hafford said the attack ended when a male passenger intervened. There were no security staff at Stirling station and the abusive woman was able to walk away.
ABORIGINAL and Torres Strait Islander flags emblazoned with swastikas and found flying on October 27 at the Broome Highway-Short Street roundabout were the work of “gutless racists”, according to Kimberley Land Council chairman Wayne Bergmann.
The flags, which hung about 2m in length from one of the newly installed roundabout lights, were reported to the Shire by a KLC staff member about 1pm. Broome Shire president Graeme Campbell said staff immediately set about removing the flags. But Horizon Power staff took the offending items down before they were required.
“I don’t know how it got there but it’s appalling that something like that happened,” Cr Campbell said. “There’s no reason for it.”
Mr Bergmann said the action was “extremely distasteful and disappointing” and he was at a loss to explain what may have sparked it. “It’s a complete disrespect, we all live in this community and it shows how pathetic some people can be in trying to incite a race card,” he said.
“The police should take this very seriously and investigate. Actions like this need to be stamped out - unless challenged they may encourage further racial vilification.”
But Mr Bergmann said he believed the majority in Broome were tolerant. He said the last time he had come across anything of this magnitude was about six years ago when pamphlets were distributed making derogatory comments about the stolen generation.
Broome police Sen. Sgt Rob Neesham said the action would not fall under racial vilification laws but declined to comment further on the incident.
Three men from the Pilbara town of Hedland have been charged over what police allege was a racially motivated attack at a local park last week.
Police allege the men taunted and racially abused a group of 20 Muslim men, women and children who had gathered at Cemetery Beach Park to celebrate the end of Ramadan.
They allegedly punched some of the men, one of whom is believed to have been struck with broken glass.
A 27-year-old man has been charged with aggravated assault occasioning bodily harm and aggravated assault that was racially motivated.
Another 27-year-old has been charged with disorderly conduct and possession of cannabis and a 29-year-old faces two counts of reckless driving.
The men have been granted bail and will appear in the South Hedland Magistrates Court later this week.
Aboriginal woman wins compo over neighbour’s racist abuse
Peter Gregory
October 2, 2008
An Aboriginal woman has won $7500 compensation for being racially vilified by a former neighbour for more than two years.
In the tiny Western Australian town of Wundowie, about 70 kilometres north-east of Perth, Kaye Campbell endured derogatory and racist name-calling from neighbour Mervyn Kirstenfeldt after she and her family moved next door in Wattle Crescent.
Mrs Campbell complained under racial discrimination laws that the abuse included name-calling while her son and his friends - some Aboriginal, and some not - were playing cricket at her house on Australia Day.
That episode earned Kirstenfeldt a disorderly conduct conviction and $600 fine in the Northam Magistrates Court.
On Monday, in the Federal Magistrates Court, he was ordered to pay Mrs Campbell compensation for a number of incidents between October 2005 and November 2007.
Magistrate Toni Lucev said Kirstenfeldt wrote an unqualified apology offering his sincerest apologies and deepest regret for anything that caused Mrs Campbell, 47, and her family distress or embarrassment.
Mr Lucev said Kirstenfeldt denied allegations of unlawful conduct when cross-examined in court, and said he had been prepared to apologise because “I just want it out of my hair”.
In her complaint to the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, Mrs Campbell said she and her family were called “black bastards” and other racist names, and were told to “go back to the scrub where we belong”.
According to the complaint: “Mrs Campbell said that she wanted … Kirstenfeldt to stop calling her names and wanted to be compensated for the pain and humiliation that … Kirstenfeldt has caused her.
She said the abuse did not stop even though she was granted a misconduct restraining order.
Mr Lucev awarded damages for the hurt and humiliation Mrs Campbell suffered. He said he would not make orders restraining Kirstenfeldt from breaching the Racial Discrimination Act in the future.
“In the court’s view, he is unlikely to do so as Mrs Campbell has moved away, and he wishes to be rid of the matter,” Mr Lucev said.
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